A sketch a day: running horse
Making friends with Zen Brush app
Zen Brush is a beautiful little app with only one step of undo and no way to save anything in its original format. No layers, the eraser is very primitive and does not help much, so best to leave it alone and pretend it’s not there at all. One black brush, two translucent gray brushes and an option to change the brush size. All brushes are round and look more and more like painting wet on wet as their sizes grow. That’s it. The app would be almost like a Zen board where your creating is gone forever unless you were quick enough to take a photo. Similarly, Zen Brush has an option to export the drawing as a PNG file.
Lovely thing for quick sketches.
A sketch a day: snow landscape
My first semi-serious attempt to do a more than a rudimentary sketch in ArtFlow app. You know what’s the best part of working in it? It saves all changes automatically and seemingly in real time, at least I haven’t lost anything yet. And I think if I ever hit the limit on the number of layers in the file it will be my phone’s fault, not the app’s.
A sketch a day: Frozen ~ pen and ink, graphite pencil on Canson drawing paper, 6″ x 4″
It started with a reference photo of majestic icicles which I managed to lose shortly after mapping some details in pencil. Not willing to dig through my huge and badly documented collections of shots taken over 15+ years, I decided to continue on my own and see where it ends. Somehow it ended in an abstract that has little to do with icicles or anything else of that kind, but it was fun to work through it without much commitment to the end result.
A sketch a day: horse head
Miscalculated where the horse should go on the piece of paper, but otherwise happy with the sketch. The subject was a beautiful chestnut, most likely a resident of the horse boarding facility across the street from our home in Cupertino, CA.
Paradise – a miniature on canvas
A kind visitor at the third weekend of recent Open Studios came up with the title, not me. I often draw during SVOS. People like to see how art is created, and whatever I am working on easily becomes a conversation piece. Sometimes I get a free benefit of getting stuff named for me.
Gathering V (rocks in pen and ink, 4″ x 4″) finished
This last little drawing completes the “Gathering” series. It going to be a while before I want to anything other than single drawings.
See the first four pieces in this series:
Silicon Valley Open Studios 2015
I will be showing on the first three weekends of May along with many wonderful artists. Two of my newest pieces were completed just in time for SVOS, and I can’t wait to share them with you. Hope you will join us!
WEEKEND ONE: MAY 2ND & 3RD
Site 339
30 Sunrise Court, Menlo Park, CA 94025
11am to 5pm
With Amanda Krauss, Krishna Mitra, Slava Shabrov, and Teresa Silvestri.
WEEKEND TWO: MAY 9TH & 10TH
Site 111
1510 Oak Avenue, Los Altos, CA 94024
11am to 5pm
With U. Q. Livd, Vaishali Sanghavi, Slava Shabrov, and Sarah Soward.
WEEKEND THREE: MAY 17TH & 18TH
Site 149
10300 Torre Avenue, Cupertino, CA 95014
Sat, May 16th – 10am to 6pm
Sun, May 17th – 12am to 6pm
With Janki Chokshi, Denise Howard, James Lee, Jessica Liu, Reynold Alex Martinez, Krishna Mitra, Slava Shabrov, Michele Smeulders, and Isabelle Stachnick.
Or see all sites in one place on my SVOS page.
A sketch a day: at the beach
A joint effort of Corel Painter Mobile and Art Flow (both Android apps), with Painter carrying out most of it because it is so good at faking oil paints. I don’t like how real oils smell and how messy the entire process is, so digital looks like a nice alternative.
A sketch a day: grazing pony
Despite several amazing finds among drawing apps and all niceties they offer, I find myself again with a piece of paper and a graphite pencil. Must be a habit.
Connections – FALC Art Exhibit at the Main Street Cafe and Books 2015
“Newborn” and “Fortitude” has been accepted into the Connections exhibit at the Main Street Cafe sponsored by the Fine Arts League of Cupertino:
The show will be open from January 31 till February 28, 2015.
There is a lot of great artworks in the show, make sure to stop by!
Main Street Cafe and Books is located at 134 Main St, Los Altos, CA 94022
Open Monay – Saturaday 7:30 am – 5:00 pm, Sunday 9:30 am -2:30 pm.
A sketch a day: horse in the snow [sold]
SVOS Winter Preview Exhibit at the San Jose Bridge Club 2015
I will have two of my older pieces at the San Jose Bridge Center from January 27 till April 28, 2015:
There will be no reception for this show.
The San Jose Bridge Center is located at 1300 White Oak, Suite 103, Campbell, CA.
A sketch a day: digital horse
I am gradually making friends with Painter Mobile Pro. Most of it happens on the Galaxy 5 phone because the screen on my tablet responds to a stylus a little erratically. The phone allows to draw surprisingly precise thin lines, it does not mind blending, smudging, or multiple layers. Well, for the most time. Every now and then it needs a little time to show me the result. Very handy for sketching on the go but still does not exactly a replacement for real tools and paper.
A sketch a day: striped leaves
Trying out new artist pens that I got for the New Year. They are Sharpy Stylo and Pigma Micron pens. So far, Micron ones win with a little finer lines and more steady ink flow (that’s the left and center leaves).
Silicon Valley Open Studios “Sneak Preview” at Art Ark Gallery
About a dozen of my artworks will be a part of the Silicon Valley Open Studios preview exhibit at the Art Ark Gallery.
Art Ark Gallery is located at 1035 South 6th Street, San Jose, CA 95112.
Gallery Hours: Saturday, January: 17th, 24th & 31st 11-4 pm.
Opening Reception: Saturday, January 10th 6-9 pm.
Closing Reception: Friday, February 6th 6-9 pm.
I will also be sitting in the gallery on January 31, 1:30 pm – 4 pm.
Stop by if you are in the area, it will be great to see you!
Other participating artists: Lisa Babbitt, Rebecca Bangs, Leanne Bouwer, Trudi Burney, Jerry Carpenter, Gabriel Coke, Angela Cunningham, John Ediger, Marianne Eichenbaum, Liz Fennell, Yvette Head, Yvonne Head, Marilynn Host, Susannah Jackson, Leslie Lambert, Jim Lee, Alyssa Levitan, Oleg Lobykin, Stephanie Maclean, Daniel McLean, Dana Nehdaran, Dariush Nehdaran, Christine Oliver, Karen Olsen, Mohana Pradhan, Christine Rasmussen, Sally Rayn, Bill Sarnoff, Edwin Simon, Anthony Stenberg, Janet Trenchard, Nancy Woods, Helen Yang.
This preview is an opportunity to see some of the art and meet the artists prior to the Open Studios held in the first three weekends of May, 2015.
A sketch a day: horse head
I wanted to finish this one yesterday and make it my last horse drawn in the departing year of the Horse, but of course that didn’t happen. So let it be the first horse of the new year with many more to follow.
I want to thank you all for following me and supporting my art and wish you all the very best in the new year 2015!
Gathering IV (rocks in pen and ink, 4″ x 4″) finished
The fourth piece in the “Gathering” series got no horses, it is dedicated to the beauty of many rock patterns.
I think I will do the final piece the same way, without any representative images. Most comments that I get about this series is about the beauty of rocks themselves it seems fitting to get back to the original idea and focus on that.
Artist trading card exchange at CAG – fall 2014
As usual, the ATC exchange at CAG today was a lot of fun. Here are my contributions to the event:
I love how the fall edition of the ATC exchange happens around my Birthday. This year it’s on a day before, so I got four early Birthday gifts:
9th Annual HARK! Exhibit & Sale
I will have a few pen and ink pieces in this show:
If you are in the area, stop by for the opening reception on December 5th, starting at 7 pm.
HARK! 9th annual holiday exhibit & sale is open from December 5th, 2014 through January 16, 2015.
KALEID gallery is located at 88 S 4th St, San Jose, California 95112
Corinthian House Art Show 2014
Corinthian House in Campbell has a new exhibit now, and several of may artworks are a part of it:
Corinthian house is located at 250 Budd Avenue, Campbell CA 95008.
The exhibit is open from 9:00am to 4:00pm, Monday through Friday till January 18, 2015.
The reception will be held on Sunday, December 7, 2014, 2 – 3:30 pm.
Silicon Valley Small Works 2014 at the Vargas Gallery
My mixed media creatures were accepted into the Silicon Valley Small Works exhibit at the Vargas Gallery on the Mission College campus:
Mission College is located at 3000 Mission College Blvd, Santa Clara, CA 95054. The gallery is in the Gillmor Center, room 102. See the map of its location here: GC-102.
The exhibit will be on from Wednesday, November 12 till Wednesday, December 10, 2014.
The opening reception for Silicon Valley Small Works will be held on Wednesday, November 12 from 4-7 pm.
The Vargas Gallery is open Mon. 3-6 pm, Tues. 1-5 pm, Wed. 3-6 pm, Thurs. 1-5 pm, Friday 1-4 pm, Sat. 12-2 pm. Closed November 27 – 30 for Thanksgiving.
A sketch a day: abstract, I think
Just let the pencils have their way with the paper to take the mind off a rather detailed pieces I work on. Not sure if the result qualifies for an abstract since there is definitely a figure in it.
After the Rain (miniature)
Here is my newest tiny digital canvas. I haven’t done any for a few months and completely forgot my past experience with colored pencil on this kind of surface. It is a bit slippery and does not allow to build up really dark darks unless you carefully plan for them from the beginning and use very sharp pencils all the time. Unlike with paper or traditional linen canvas it is not possible to start with lighter colors everywhere and then go darker in as many layers as necessary. Darker colors on a digital canvas start to chip off relatively quickly if you are not careful.
So with a refreshed memory, I am now going to use digital canvas with soft graphite pencils only and leave colors to linen ones. Or maybe it’s worth trying to gesso a digital canvas and see if it becomes more tolerant to dark colored pencils.
The original miniature ($35.00) is available in my Miniatures online gallery.